About Me

Like many others, I'm here because I love to write, and think my opinions are relavant. Whether you agree or not, I'd like to hear from you, as long as it's respectful. Politeness is optional. By the time you read this, odds are that I'll be a father. I've been married since July 7 2007
(7-7-7: cool, eh? We both got it engraved on the inside of our rings!) We have two cats and a dog. I'm also a bassist who dabbles on guitar, and can fake-it on drums.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Puppy's as Birth Control

Has this title gotten your imagine going in uncomfortable directions? Hear me out, it will make a world of sense in just a minute.

When we got Kuma about 14 months ago, he was just five weeks old and VERY high-maintenance. Asides from the constant attention he was demanding, there was a lot of clean-up, earning him the nickname ‘Lord Piddly-Squirts Von Bitesalot. Esquire. On his first day home, Andrea greeted me at the door, saying “We’ve adopted a Fountain!” A few months later, we felt it was safe to rent a steam-cleaner for the carpets. After more than ten hours of working with this thing (and about $85), it was less than half-an-hour after I got home from returning the steam-cleaner, he puked on the carpet. I nearly wept.

For the first six months of his stay with us, he slept in a kennel in our room, and he’d wake up 3-4 times a night to have us take him out to relieve himself, because he wouldn’t foul his little environment. Then he would take over an hour to settle enough to go back to sleep. Andrea and I took turns – whoever wasn’t working the next day would get up with him. This totally robbed weekends of their charm; “Whoopie, two nights of getting up three times a night.”

Now I’m thinking, when our kids get to that special age, when they know what “Getting Intimate” is, and they’re thinking about taking that step, I’d like to get her a puppy. When she’s been getting up through the night for a few weeks, I can tell her that “This is about 8% of what it’s like to be a parent.”

For the record, Andrea’s not sold on this idea. She’s pretty confident that this Puppy Parenting will fall to us, and the lesson will be lost on her.

Of course, it’s all moot, since my little girl is going to grow up to be a Nun-Doctor-Astronaut, and won’t need to know about parenting.

haha a nun-doctor-astronaunt eh? haha good luck with that, every father hopes that their girl will stay at home for the rest of their lives, but unfortunatly for them, and great for the girls they don't. The puppy idea is a really good idea, just make sure that she is old enough to know what the responsibly is.